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St George expedition to the South Pacific

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St George expedition to the South Pacific
Start9 April 1924 Edit this on Wikidata
Participants

The St George expedition to the South Pacific took place over the period 1924-1925 and was sponsored by the Scientific Expeditionary Research Association.[1] The objective was a partial replication of Darwin’s famous journey to the South Sea.[2]

Logistics

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The expedition set out from Dartmouth harbour on 9 April 1924. The vessel, the SY St George, was a 1000 tonne sailing yacht equipped with a laboratory and dark rooms and was captained by David Blair (OBE), who had sailed with the Titanic on its sea trials but had been transferred from the crew just before its fateful voyage.[3] The expedition's Scientific Director was James Hornell[4] and the others on board included a mix of scientists and tourists with divergent aims and interests.[2]

The cruise sailed to Madeira,[5] crossed the Atlantic, landing at Trinidad and Tobago and from there sailed down the Panama Canal into the Pacific Ocean. In the Pacific they called into the Galapagos, the Marquesas, the Society Islands[6] and Easter Island before returning to Panama and recrossing the Atlantic[2] to arrive in the UK in returning October 1925.[3]

Scientific members of the expedition

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The team of naturalists included:

Science

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Due to ill-health Riley left the expedition in Panama and returned from there to the UK.[13] After Riley's departure the additional responsibility of collecting and preserving plant specimens was taken on by Longfield, Collenette and Cheesman.[14] Cheesman considered the expedition to be disorganised, and left the expedition in Tahiti, along with Crossland.[2]

Although Hornell's records and collections from the Marquesas Islands have subsequently been seen as a "missed opportunity",[15] after the expedition's return to the UK a number of other scientists worked on a variety of samples collected during the voyage. These included work by Edward Bagnall Poulton and Norman Denbigh Riley on butterflies and work on various moths.[16] John Read le Brockton Tomlin reported on molluscs collected,[17] and Frederick Wallace Edwards worked on nematocera (a group of flies).[18] A number of scientists studied material collected by Crossland including various crabs which were worked on by Susan Finnegan,[19][20] bryozoa which were worked on by Anna Birchall Hastings[21] and polychaetes.[22]

References

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  1. ^ "Scientific Expeditionary Research". Nature. 111 (2776): 64. 1923. Bibcode:1923Natur.111Q..64.. doi:10.1038/111064a0.
  2. ^ a b c d "Cynthia Longfield and the St George expedition". Royal Irish Academy. 30 April 2024. Retrieved 4 May 2025.
  3. ^ a b "Titanic's Officers - RMS Titanic - Second Officer Blair". Retrieved 4 May 2025.
  4. ^ Hornell, James (1924). "The St. George Expedition to the Pacific" (PDF). Nature. 114 (2871): 681. Bibcode:1924Natur.114..681H. doi:10.1038/114681a0.
  5. ^ a b Riley, L. A. M. (1925). "Notes on Madeira Plants. ("St. George" Pacific Expedition, 1924.)". Bulletin of Miscellaneous Information (Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew) (1): 26–33. doi:10.2307/4107436. JSTOR 4107436. Retrieved 4 May 2025.
  6. ^ Chubb, Lawrence John; Smith, Walter Campbell (1927). "On the Geology of Maiao (Society Islands)". Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society of London. 83 (1–5): 342–345. Bibcode:1927QJGS...83..342C. doi:10.1144/GSL.JGS.1927.083.01-05.13.
  7. ^ Hornell, James (1926). The Archaeology of Gorgona Island South America. (St. George Expedition to the South Seas, 1924). Retrieved 4 May 2025.
  8. ^ Crossland, Cyril (1927). "XXIII.—The Expedition to the South Pacific of the S.Y. "St. George." Marine Ecology and Coral Formations in the Panama Region, the Galapagos and Marquesas Islands, and the Atoll of Napuka". Transactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. 55 (2): 531–554. doi:10.1017/S008045680001646X. Retrieved 4 May 2025.
  9. ^ "Petrology of the Galapagos Islands". Darwin Online. 2022.
  10. ^ Chubb, L. J. (1925). "The St. George Scientific Expedition". Geological Magazine. 62 (8): 369–373. Bibcode:1925GeoM...62..369C. doi:10.1017/S0016756800105874. Retrieved 4 May 2025.
  11. ^ Collenette, Cyril Leslie (1926). Sea-Girt Jungles. The Experiences of a Naturalist with the "St. George" Expedition. [With Plates.]. Retrieved 4 May 2025.
  12. ^ Collenette, C. L. (1929). "The Arctiidae, Noctuidae and Sphingidae of the "St. George" Expedition, from French Oceania". Transactions of the Royal Entomological Society of London. 76 (2): 469–487. Bibcode:1929EcoEn..76..469C. doi:10.1111/j.1365-2311.1929.tb01416.x. Retrieved 4 May 2025.
  13. ^ a b Hornell, James; Crossland, Cyril; Johnson, G. H.; Kelsall, H. J.; Cheesman, L. C.; Collenette, C. L.; Chubb, L. J. (1924). "St. George Expedition to the Pacific". Science. 60 (1558): 423–424. Bibcode:1924Sci....60..423H. doi:10.1126/science.60.1558.423. Retrieved 4 May 2025.
  14. ^ Byrne, Angela (2019). "Constructing the Global Irish Woman Traveller: Cynthia Longfield's Scientific Researches in South America, 1921-27". ABEI Journal. 21 (2): 27-36. Retrieved 4 May 2025.
  15. ^ "Restoring a photographic record of the Marquesan past: The St George Expedition to the South Sea Islands, 1924-25". Royal Anthropological Institute. 2014. Retrieved 4 May 2025.
  16. ^ Meyrick, Edward (1929). "The Micro-lepidoptera of the "St. George" Expedition". Transactions of the Royal Entomological Society of London. 76 (2): 499–500. Bibcode:1929EcoEn..76..489M. doi:10.1111/j.1365-2311.1929.tb01417.x.
  17. ^ Tomlin, John Read le Brockton (1926). "The Mollusca of the 'St. George' Expedition: (II) The West Indies". Journal of Conchology. Retrieved 4 May 2025.
  18. ^ Edwards, F.W. (1927). "XXXI.— Diptera Nematocera from the South Pacific collected by the 'St. George' expedition , 1925". Annals and Magazine of Natural History. 20 (116): 236–244. doi:10.1080/00222932708655590.
  19. ^ Finnegan, Susan (5 November 1931). "Report on the Brachyura collected in Central America, the Gorgona and Galapagos Islands, by Dr. Crossland on the ' St. George ' Expedition to the Pacific, 1924–25". Journal of the Linnean Society of London, Zoology. 37 (255): 607–673. doi:10.1111/j.1096-3642.1931.tb02367.x. Retrieved 4 May 2025.
  20. ^ Finnegan, Susan (1931). "Report on the Brachyura collected in Central America, the Gorgona and Galapagos Islands, by Dr. Crossland on the ' St. George ' Expedition to the Pacific, 1924-25". Journal of the Linnean Society of London, Zoology. 37 (255): 607–673. doi:10.1111/j.1096-3642.1931.tb02367.x. Retrieved 4 May 2025.
  21. ^ Hastings, Anna B. (1929). "Cheilostomatous Polyzoa from the Vicinity of the Panama Canal collected by Dr. C. Crossland on the Cruise of the S.Y. 'St. George'". Proceedings of the Zoological Society of London. 99 (4): 702. doi:10.1111/j.1096-3642.1929.tb01453.x. Retrieved 4 May 2025.
  22. ^ Monro, C. C. A. (1933). "1. The Polychæta Errantia collected by Dr. C. Crossland at Colón, in the Panama Region, and the Galapagos Islands during the Expedition of the S.Y. ' St. George.'". Proceedings of the Zoological Society of London. 103: 1–96. doi:10.1111/j.1096-3642.1933.tb01578.x. Retrieved 4 May 2025.
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